Many endoscopes and other elongate medical devices that are designed to be advanced into the body include a shaft with one or more lumens therein. The lumens provide passageways between the distal and proximal ends of the shaft to direct air or water or surgical tools through the device. Alternatively, the lumens may be used to route internal components such as steering wires that selectively orient the distal tip of the device or electrical wires through the device.
One method of creating the lumens in the device is to insert individual tubes that form the lumens into the shaft. However, in order to keep the diameter of the device as small as possible, there is often little free space in the shaft for the tubes. As such, the tubes may bind or become wedged and difficult to advance through the shaft. Alternatively, the tubes may only fit in the shaft if they are arranged in a certain pattern, which is difficult to maintain as the tubes are incorporated into the shaft. Finally, by constructing the device using individual tubes for the lumens, it is generally necessary to keep a large inventory of tubes of various sizes at the location where such endoscopes or medical devices are assembled.
Given these problems, there is need for a medical device having multiple interior lumens that is more cost effective and easier to manufacture.